Chapter 11: Adoption

Summary

• The chapter discusses the pros and cons of adoption, such as providing a good home for a child in need, avoiding potential medical and psychological stress of fertility treatments, avoiding high-risk pregnancies, and the potential to choose your child's gender. However, adoption also comes with costs and the scrutiny of home evaluations.
• Adoption can be an option for those struggling with fertility, those with environmental/overpopulation concerns, gay couples, couples that have been unsuccessful with further pregnancies, and single individuals looking to avoid the complications of pregnancy and co-parenting.
• Four guidelines for considering adoption are mentioned: do reality testing, talk to successful adoptive parents, deal with the disappointment of infertility, consider the needs of the current family, and be realistic about potential challenges, particularly if adopting a mentally, emotionally, or physically impaired child.
• Different forms of adoption include domestic adoptions (through agency or independently), and international adoptions (through agency or independently).
• Special Needs Adoption and Legal Risk Adoptions are also mentioned, which involve adopting older children, children with disabilities, or children of color, as well as fostering children with the hope to eventually adopt them.
• The chapter also discusses Transracial or Multi-Cultural adoption, which involves adopting children of different racial or cultural backgrounds. Challenges and resources for these types of adoptions are mentioned.
• An overview of the "home study" adoption process is given, which includes informational meetings, paperwork, background checks, individual and couple meetings, group classes, follow-up meetings, and home visits.
• The chapter touches on the possibility of pursuing pregnancy and adoption simultaneously and provides four guidelines: choose an honest agency, communicate openly with your partner, manage your time and energy, ideally schedule adoption visits and doctor's appointments separately.